Surface reactions of ferritic steel particles atomized with water or mixtures of water-additive

The production of metallic powders has been a very important industrial act ivity for many years. In this work, the water or a mixture water-additive a tomization process has been used. During the production of steel particles by water atomization these particles are coated with a surface oxide layer. With particles under these conditions it is very difficult to obtain final products with high mechanical properties, so that it is desirable to dimin ish the surface oxide as much as possible. Experimental tests to know if th e use of additives as corrosion inhibitors, used to avoid steel oxidation a t room temperature, could modify the properties of particles during the man ufacture of an AISI C1115 steel by water atomization were carried out. In o rder to improve the knowledge of the chemical surface reactions, characteri zation of the powder surfaces and interfaces of metal matrix/oxide layer by means of Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS), Scanning Electron Microscop y (SEM), X-ray Diffraction and Anger Electron Spectroscopy (AES) was carrie d out.